WI: get ready for WGO again

Yesterday I got a phone call from none other than Executive Director of Wisconsin Gun Owners.

He said he was working on the WGO's fall newsletter, which would come out after the elections. And he was asking me to comment on whether the WCCA would push for Vermont-style carry if Mark Green wins and the Republicans retain control of the legislature.

I replied that, in the last newsletter, he had described WCCA volunteers as amateurs when it comes to lobbying, and that therefore he, as a "professional," should contact legislators himself to push for a Vermont-style bill.

I also said that I was surprised by his call, since: a) I despise him; b) he made a big mistake by going after Senator Dave Zien; c) that he came very close to getting hit with a libel suit over the last newsletter; and d) that anything I would say to him would be quoted out of context in his newsletter.

It's pretty obvious from this call that, if we win in the November elections, WGO is going to try to kill our CCW bill again.

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Personally, I think it's clear Corey is a scammer running the WGO for his own personal enrichment, and his "Vermont Stance" is nothing more than a mechanism to set himself apart from the NRA, the WIPGM, and the WCCA/WCCM to what he sees as his "constituency". (a.k.a. "donors", a.k.a. "marks", a.k.a. "rubes"…)

Anyone who has more than two neurons rubbing together upstairs knows that if WI has been a holdout state on shall-issue CCW when over 3/4ths of the US is now shall-issue, and is one of only two no-issue states (on paper, not just in practice) in the entire U.S. jumping straight to "Vermont Carry" is pure fantasy, and directly detrimental to advancing RKBA in WI.

Although, I'll say it again: To date, I think the WGO's having all the impact of a fart in a hurricane. If the WGO gets any mention or attention from the legislature, or the WI MSM, I'll take it as a sign of desperation on the part of the other side, and good news for the PPA. If the WGO gets any airtime, it's a last ditch "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" kind of gambit.

If anything, the WGO's position would actually help advance the PPA, because it would look so reasonable as compared to such impractical extremism.

Corey's only riling up two groups, the realistic committed PPA supporters who he peeves off, and the "tin foil hat" gun owners who were already lost to us anyway. Those who already send Corey money, probably in small unmarked bills, or postal money orders bought with fake ID's while wearing Groucho Marx glasses...

Monkeyleg

October 12, 2006, 06:30 PM

AJ, he's a hard read at this point.

(Incidentally, Executive Director also called our NRA/ILA lobbyist in Fairfax, VA and left a message wanting to talk about the same thing).

I cut ED short this time, but spent about an hour and a half last year talking to him, trying to see if we could reach common ground.

There are several plausible reasons for ED doing what he's doing:

1. He's doing this for the money. Where required, he's already reported some tidy little sums for what he does, although I strongly suspect that there are much larger amounts of money that are hidden from public view. For example, how much of the $84,000 that ED reported spending on lobbying last year was paid to Graff Communications?

2. He's working as a shill for anti-gun groups or perhaps for anti-gun Democrats, possibly even Doyle. That idea is not out of the realm of possibility. What he's been doing has been undermining support for the PPA at the very time when we need that support. And Democrat opponents of the PPA have used quotes from WGO on the floor of the legislature as justification for voting against the bill. The very fact that WGO would go after Dave Zien, who is the most pro-gun member of the state senate, lends credence to the idea that WGO is a shill group.

3. He really believes some of all that he's saying. I'm tending to believe that less and less, in part because of the amount of money that's involved. The WCCM has raised about $35,000 for political candidates this year alone. ED could use the greater amounts that WGO is raising to actually promote Vermont-style carry, but instead is using the money to tear down Zien, Gunderson, the NRA, and the WCCA. ED switched the Election Board status of WGO-PAC from a political action committee (which is for raising funds to contribute to candidates) to an independent expenditure group which can run ads attacking candidates. In this case, Dave Zien.

4. Or maybe it's some combination of all of the above.

One thing is for certain: the more he says, and the longer he's on the scene, the more likely it is we'll find out what the truth is.

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